The Last Breath
by kelvel0302
Summary: "Lastly, I wish I didn't get this, so that I could live for long enough to correct every mistake I have done in the past. But unfortunately, this disease is bound to kill me, and I'd never be able to do what I should to straighten out the lines."
1. Chapter 1

**How can Zuko be able to deal with it? Before, she lost all control, but now the case is very much different. This was worse than he expected. Will she be able to get her life back? Or will they just wait until she fades from her last breath?**

"Now's not the time to quit. What has gotten into you?! You even cut those dextrose off and you kept crushing your pills!"

All she ever replied was a smug grin which cracked her pale lips. Silence was the only thing present, alongside the beeping sound from her heart monitor and her loud breaths. She never gave him a glance, given that he was sitting just right next to her on the bed.

Of course, she was dying very, very soon. The disease was spread and has gotten deep into her bones. She wasn't able to walk anymore, her breath has gotten shorter, her eyes were sullen and her hairline was barely even there. She looked like a skeleton, only with a skin placed atop.

She smiled, "I'm sleeping."

Her brother sighed with his mouth open and bit his lip in disbelief. As she covered herself underneath the sheets, he stood up and clung his fingers to his hair so tight. He was uncertain of what to do or even what to say. Then tears start to flow out from his eyes, and so was hers. He grabbed her sheets away and threw it to the other side of the room.

"What are you doing?!" she was sobbing and finally, she gave him a glare. Her eyes were so lifeless, it was no longer amber.

"Drink your medicine, now."

"No. Thank you. Now hand me those sheets, let me sleep, then leave me alone."

"Drink them."

She wiped her eyes and sighed hopelessly as she grabbed the pills lying on the desk then swallowed it. "Are you happy now?" She drank the glass of water next to it before she lay on her side opposite to her brother and ignored the rest of what happened.

"Yeah..."

She was still sobbing slightly, she was freezing even if it was in the middle of a heat wave plaguing the capital, probably because of the sickness destroying her body slowly in every second..

He walked to the door and grabbed the sheets, placed it over her body and caressed her head. "Good night..."

He didn't want to leave her, so he spent the rest of the night on that couch facing her bed.

And thus that's how their night was ended.

It was 3AM in the morning, and she just didn't felt right, so she tried to get up without waking her brother. She quietly got on her wheel chair and went over to the bathroom just inside the hospital facility they're in.

She was vomiting all over the sink, later she started to cough up so loud to wake him up. It was painful in her chest and the ribs, but she couldn't control it. She stopped vomiting for a while when she haw him stood there beside the door. She held it back and wiped off her mouth.

"I'm fine..." she went away with her wheelchair, leaving him behind, but then she started to gag up again and he knew she was about to vomit again.

"No, you're not." So he ran back to her and took her back to the sink. She let it all out while he took a glass of water and some medicine.

"Let's stop this. Just let me go. Leave me here to rot. What's all of this for? You knew I won't be able to survive. Why waste your time? Let's end this, brother. I want to die. Kill me!"

She was staring at the sink, trying to catch her breath.

"It's not yet over. Azula! Snap out of it! If you think your life wasn't good enough, you have to live and start over! Drink this..."

He handed her the medicine and held the glass of water for her to drink. He saw the her hands were shaking, probably with the way she felt. He knew she feared death. And day by day, her life was withering like a leaf that fell from a tree. Fragile and hopeless, stripped away from life.

After what happened, she couldn't sleep. His words were stuck in her head. She kept thinking why life seemed so always unfair, at least for her.

Her parents were no good. Her mother had left and their father was a monster. She had no friends, she had them once but they eventually betrayed her. Everyone hated her. At least her brother got through everything and had it his way in the end but it was not the same for her. She was never happy in her life, not even once... She broke down and was insane at fourteen, she was sent off to a mental institution before they found out that she had this cancer a year after when they found her in that valley weeks later when she ran away. Then it's been over 9 months again, she's still spinning into a downward spiral. And by that moment everyone knew, including her, that her life was soon over.

Sure she deserved it with the way she treated everyone, but she knew that everything that happened to her was not solely her fault. She could hear the wall clock ticking, she let that sound seep in, reminding her that the time is near. She'll never be able to fix everything.

With that, she called it a night, she stared at him once more before she closed her eyes to sleep.

 **Hey everyone, thanks for reading. I just wanted to put a different story here. One that I've always imagined ever since. Will the sickness be able to change her? If so, is everything too late for her? Leave a review or suggestion, thanks!**


	2. Chapter 2

"Well, if it isn't for you, water tribe boy. I want to know why you're here. And also, by the way, where's Zuzu?" she demanded that moment she went awake. She propped herself up and sat on her bed, then stared at him who was sitting on that couch, reading something.

"Geez, are you really like that all the time? You know, a 'good morning' would sound nice... But uh... of course, it's you."

She rolled her eyes and sighed. "Well?"

"He got into an urgent meeting and he had to travel all the way to Republic City. So he asked me to go here instead.. to uh... watch you until he comes back..."

She laughed, "You? To watch over me? Please... This must be some kind of joke."

"Yeah yeah, blabber all you want, but the Fire Lord sent me here and you can't do anything about it so just keep your mouth shut!"

She chuckled proudly which annoyed him, "Okay, water tribe boy, no need to burst up like that."

"I have a name, it's Sokka."

"Sokka, right." she then rolled her eyes for the second time.

There was a sudden knock on the door, which quickly ended their conversation. It was her doctor who entered carrying a tray full of apparatuses and probably some pills again.

"Good morning, your highness. How are you feeling?"

"Um, I feel very much the same, I appreciate your concern." It just didn't sound right, but it was more on the sarcastic side rather than very welcoming.

"Oh... Uh, I see. Though I have to inform you that you will be needing to use this breathalyzer from now on everywhere you go. This is to prevent your hyperventilation and some other lung related problems, you will attach these nasal cannulas along with it as well. We've examined your lungs and immune system yesterday and it's getting very, very weak. We have to treat it as soon as possible."

"What's new? What am I getting from this? From the beginning I was diagnosed with this, you said you have to hospitalize me to lure this illness away, but the latter never happened. You keep on injecting medicine in my veins, you kept giving me pills but I've always felt the same way since. To be honest, I felt worse than I ever was."

"Please... we insist."

"No! That's just going to kill me! Like all the pills and treatments you've given me!"

"Azula, calm down..."

"Stop, Sokka! I'm telling the truth! I don't want this anymore! I'd rather die in the easiest way instead!"

"Azula!"

"Why would you care about me? Isn't this what you and your sister want to see?! To see me rot away like this?! To see me suffer?! I've done enough to hurt all of you and I knew I deserve this! But I just can't take this punishment anymore! I'm so fed up!"

"No. Because we actually care even if you caused us trouble so much, even if you still loathe us. Because we have good intentions for others even if it's you and never will we wish for something like that to happen. And Azula, you don't deserve this. Just like your brother, you need a second chance, you deserve to live..."

Azula bit her lip in frustration. The words that came out from Sokka's mouth pierced her thoughts. She knew it was true, even her brother too. Maybe she really didn't deserve this after all. That maybe, this is just some game to redeem herself and change for good. _Snap out of it! If you think your life wasn't good enough, You have to live and start over._

She took the breathalyzer, pushed it on and placed the nasal cannulas in her nostrils. The doctor gestured quickly to help her, but she insisted "It's fine. I can do it, doctor. You're dismissed."

"Yes. Your highness."

Then the door closed shut, so are her eyes. Minutes passed, Sokka could hear nothing but her short breaths and the loud noise of breathalyzer.

"Why do you have to be so stubborn? You see.. Everyone's trying to help you."

"You just don't know what I've been through."

"Like what? Your life seemed perfect, even better than Zuko's. It just didn't end up with the way you wanted it to be. What more could you ask for?"

She smiled at him, but soon averted her stare as she held her head up facing the ceiling "I wish my mom loved me as much as she loved Zuko. I wish she never left." it sounded peaceful, she took a moment to breathe and further continued.

"I wish my father didn't have to raise me in a certain manner so I wouldn't have to end up this way, so that maybe I'd have a better perspective in life."

She kept thinking for further reasons and sighed. "Right. I wish I never let go of Mai and Ty Lee just like that, I wish I didn't used fear to make them stay."

For the final part, she stared at him shortly then slowly bowed to look at her wrists where numerous vein-like tubes were attached and injected through her skin. "And lastly, I wish I didn't got this, so that I could live for longer to correct my mistakes. Or maybe I could wish that my life is far different from this... It isn't that too much to ask. One factor can change everything... but that never happened. So I'll just have to deal with this instead." Azula accidentally brushed her thin hair with her fingers because she felt depressed talking about that matter especially in front of that water tribe boy she barely even knew, and as expected, a huge clump of it came off of her head.

She held on to it tightly. Sokka saw it for sure, she knew he did. That was probably her last piece. Now, she was completely bald, looking very lifeless. Sokka didn't want to see this, despite the rough friction between them in their past, so he decided to cool things down for a while.

He sighed. " Probably I should get us something to eat. It's almost noon."

"Yeah, you're right."

"I'll be back in a second."

 **Reviews/ Suggestions are highly appreciated. Thanks for reading.**


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